


Teeth

by longhairshortfuse



Series: Backstory 101 [3]
Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Bullying, Friendship, Implied Neglect, M/M, Name Calling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-12
Updated: 2017-02-12
Packaged: 2018-09-23 18:47:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9671399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/longhairshortfuse/pseuds/longhairshortfuse
Summary: Inspired by ep101."Aby, pleasshhe don' make me go do shchoooool!"Aby handed her brother a plastic bag with some sandwiches in it."Mom said you have to go to school," snapped Aby. "Move, now, or you'll be late."





	

"It's not so bad. Anyway, you should think yourself lucky we can afford for you to get your teeth fixed." Aby barely glanced at Cecil's misery. Cecil tried again to protest.  
"Id isshhhh! Aby, pleasshhe don' make me go do shchoooool!"  
Aby handed her brother a plastic bag with some sandwiches in it.  
"Mom said you have to go to school," snapped Aby. "Move, now, or you'll be late."

Cecil knew there was no point arguing with his sister. Mom was in charge, on some level, but Aby made sure things got done when they needed to. This did not mean that Aby did things for Cecil. He learned quickly which buttons to press on the rattly washing machine and how much of the blue-flecked white detergent powder was too much. He'd learned to keep his room at a tolerable level of almost-squalor, and he knew how to make the kind of meals that came in crinkly packages to be opened into a pan of boiling water. He could organise himself, although having Aby make his sandwiches when she made her own was nice.

Aby sure could be bossy, thought Cecil. He nursed a feeling that combined love and resentment and admiration and hurt anger with a touch of worship and a leaden, indigestible chunk of foreboding that soon Aby would leave for college and he'd be on his own. On his own _with mom_ he corrected himself with shame. He examined the sandwiches, peeling back the cling-wrap to see what was inside. Cheese, thinly pared. Maybe Earl would share his.

Showered and dressed in five minutes, a quick look in on mom, and Cecil was out the door. He'd remembered his homework at the last minute, dashing back into his room to pick up the envelope of photographs that provided insubstantial evidence of his existence before this exact point in time. Everyone was to make a humdrum timeline of their lives with photographs to show what they looked like during events they considered key. Cecil picked birth (mom, tired, watching too-young Aby staring with concern lest she drop the brand new brother in her skinny arms), starting school (a fearful grimace of a smile on his lips but no further while Earl looked like he'd won a prize, best friends with their arms around one another's shoulders), tasting his first cup of coffee (eyes screwed shut, nose wrinkled, mouth turned downwards, a little out of focus, mom cry-laughing and reaching to retrieve her stolen cup. Aby must've taken that one but he didn't remember). Finally, two photographs taken quite close together. One of Cecil grinning for the camera, crooked teeth crowding pink gums, the other with his lips pulled back to reveal the metalwork that would, hopefully, one day, give him a smile he would be pleased to display in public.

He was too late to catch Earl at the bus stop. Earl was a _scout_ and always prepared. Perfect pressed shirt, tidy hair, everything important in a folder, everything Cecil was not. Yet their friendship worked well, they each reflected the best of the other and absorbed the rest without much comment. Sure they disagreed: about who was the best player on the spiderwolves team (obviously it was Earl, insisted Cecil, but his friend was far too modest) or about whether sugar-ring donuts really were better than chocolate-filled. Cecil mostly argued trivial matters so that Earl's eyes would crinkle and he would laugh with mock-scorn, maybe throw a soft punch and the friends could tussle it out, safe in the knowledge that it was just a silly fight to see who was right.

Cecil decided to walk. On the way to school he could craft his excuse. Maybe _mom needed me so I left the house late_ (which only ever earned him looks of pity and tight-lipped kinda-smiles) or _I missed the bus because I saw it again, that dark planet lit by no sun_ (which might win him a morning in the medical room with Nurse tutting and shaking their head), or maybe... No. Cecil decided on the truth. If he did not get to his seat before the second bell, he would admit that he got almost all the way there in plenty of time but ran back for his homework. Well, it was a _version_ of the truth, so that was okay. Right?

A slight smile and unfocused eyes, the trademark of his daydreaming, caused Cecil to miss the sound of footsteps behind him in the eerily deserted yard. He'd miraculously slipped through the gates before they were closed and locked (to keep danger out, of course, why else would schools be secured once all the teenagers were inside?) therefore he avoided the indignity of signing in and delivering his excuse to a bored official. The footsteps thumped louder, closer. A slap across the back of his skull made Cecil's head reel, ears ring, body tense for flight.

"Hey! Ugly kid! Whatchagot there?"

They walked either side of him, head and shoulders taller, broader, looming bigger as he shrank away. Someone behind pulled the tattered bag from his shoulder.  
"I'll carry your bag." The voice behind him sniggered. There was a clatter and _whump_ as Cecil's possessions landed on the ground. "Oops, silly me!"  
Meaty hands wrapped his slender arms and Cecil stood helpless, held back by one whilst two toed through his school things. Heels ground his pencils into useless splinters, dirtied and crumpled his books. One of them picked up Cecil's sandwiches, ripped open the cling-wrap, took a bite, spat and threw them away to land with a splat against the side of the nearest plastic trashcan.  
"No wonder you're an ugly li'l runt if that's all your mom feeds you. You look like a rat."

Cecil felt his cheeks flame and his eyes prickle. He blinked and looked away. He would _not_ give them the satisfaction of seeing him cry. Not this time.

The one holding him shifted his grip to Cecil's forearm and forced him to point.  
"Wassat, huh?"  
One of the others picked up the envelope.  
"What've we got here? Mom give you cash for a school trip or something? Maybe we got lucky and we can go for burgers after school today!" She looked inside and cursed. "Photos. Shoulda known a kid like you wouldn't have any money. Hey, look, the rat was even ugly as a baby!"  
She held up the photographs and the three laughed and jeered.

 _That your mom? Wow she's ugly too. Bet she cried when she laid eyes on you!_  
_Aww lookit your big sister. Whole family looks like a fucking freakshow._  
_Where's daddy-rat? He fuck your mom in the dark then run away when he saw her?_  
_Hahaha smile for us! The orthodontist got his work cut out with you!_  
_You'll still be ugly as fuck. Save your mom some money._  
_Ugly baby, ugly kid, ugly adult. You wonder why you got no friends, rat?_  
_Oh loooook, here he is with his only friend! Is that..._

"EARL!"  
Cecil was small but his voice was not. The roar reached the trickle of kids coming from the double doors at the far end of the yard and one pelted towards Cecil and his tormentors. By the time Earl reached him, maybe five or six seconds, the trio had melted away into the growing hustle of students with things to do and places to be.

Cecil knelt on the ground to salvage what he could. Earl helped him, carefully wiping the shiny photo paper and replacing the photos in their envelope before gathering the detritus that was beyond repair and binning it along with the pathetic, soiled sandwich.  
"You okay?"  
Cecil nodded once, not looking up as he stuffed ruined books and damaged trinkets back into his bag. He found the business end of one pencil intact and went to put it in his pocket but Earl grabbed his hand to stop him. Cecil flinched and Earl let go.  
"Sorry. You'll tear your pocket if you do that. I have a spare. You can have it if you want."

Small kindnesses were more than Cecil could bear. He burst and overflowed, covered his face with his hands as if that would staunch his frustrated flood. Earl chewed his lip and frowned, looked left and right then put one arm carefully around his friend's shoulders. Cecil trembled, desperately trying to get his hot and twisted face back under control. Earl held him tight and he focused on the solid weight of Earl's arm, the warm pressure of his hand, the security of his nearness. Cecil took a deep breath.  
"Thankssh. I'm okay," he tried on a smile, "I'm okay."  
Earl laughed and ruffled Cecil's hair, bear-hugging him for three blissful seconds.  
"Course you are. Mom gave me money for the canteen and I forgot and made sandwiches too. You want my extra lunch? It's peanut butter."  
"Yessh pleasshe."

Cecil smiled more easily now, the attack in history that he could pretend wasn't real, not on his timeline. If there was no evidence then it didn't really happen, right? And Earl made everything better. Cecil knew the story about lunch was a lie, but a kind one so that was allowed. Earl walked with Cecil to his class, chatting about this and that, not even minding Cecil's slurred, lisping, reluctant speech.

"This is you," Earl said, stopping outside a blue-painted door with a square window of reinforced glass. Inside, students went about the business of opening books and writing dates, underlining titles and turning to chat and giggle while the teacher banged on the desk for attention. Cecil nodded, slipped his hand into Earl's for a moment and squeezed. Earl squeezed back.  
"Wait for me, I'll meet you outside your class before lunch and we can eat in the canteen. We both have Authorised Geography, right?"  
Cecil nodded, lisped out his thanks again, watched Earl turn and wave from the end of the corridor.

Later, in Approved History class, Cecil glued his photographs to his timeline display. He paused at the photograph of five year old Cecil and six year old Earl, the scant months between them seeming a gulf back then, and pondered what to write. He'd planned _started school_ and a short paragraph about how he felt about taking the big yellow bus with his friend and having to sit where the driver told him, Aby's old schoolbag straps soft on his shoulders in contrast to Earl's stiff leather satchel, walking into a yard full of frenetic screeching while an adult rang a handbell by the door and older kids, how grown up they had looked!, scrambled to get into the straightest line and earn the privilege of entering the building first. But that seemed to miss the point, that was not the pivotal event in his past that it should have been.

Cecil smiled with his lips closed and wrote in his best handwriting using Earl's pen.

_Met my best friend. I didn't know he was my best friend yet, but he still is and I hope he always will be._


End file.
